First exhibited at “Deterioration . . . They Said” at The Migros Museum, Zurich
2009

“In Trapped and Frozen Forever 1, A large HD video projection is juxtaposed with a large collage (7 x13 feet). An image of the young girl from the film Poltergeist is repeated in the foreground of both the still and moving images, as a maelstrom of cultural material encircles her. The electronic version of the girl attempts to reach out and connect with the physical version, and vice versa. One version is infinitely trapped inside an ephemeral, ever-changing space, while the other is frozen forever in the realms of the physical.”

First exhibited at “Deterioration, They Said” Migros Museum, Zurich, 2008:

“American artists Cory Arcangel, Jessica Ciocci & Jacob Ciocci / Paper Rad, Shana Moulton and Ryan Trecartin & Lizzie Fitch, have been brought together for the exhibition entitled DETERIORATION, THEY SAID. Each will present an individual project in the migros museum für gegenwartskunst. In their works the artists create an overreaching, colour-charged aesthetic of excessive density of content, reacting to the consumer-oriented condition of Western society, while at the same time formulating something out of it. In their image spaces the four positions address a culture of excess, constructing their critique via a form of appropriation, which simultaneously releases a veritable deluge of images. In the tradition of experimental film and “Scatter Art” they probe potential unconventional narrative patterns and test for the disintegration of stereotypes. As a result, the video works are often shown in sculptural settings, in which fragments of pop culture and hand-crafted forms are amalgamated into an “intermedial Gesamtkunstwerk”.

The label PAPER RAD, founded in 2000 by JESSICA CIOCCI (born 1976 in Lexington, Kentucky), JACOB CIOCCI (born 1976 in Lexington, Kentucky) and BEN JONES (born 1977 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania), uses the most varied media, including video, drawings and wall painting, and also combines with art sectors such as fashion and photography. Paper Rad is not active only in the art world; it also infiltrates cyberspace. In the videos – many of which are made by Jacob Ciocci – TV film outtakes and self-drawn comic and animation pieces are assembled into rapidly cut, hallucinatory flights that can be read as commentaries on the contemporary media world. The Mandala-like, rainbow-coloured neo-geo drawings by Jessica Ciocci directly reflect, in their mixture of excess and monotony, today’s consumption and youth culture.”